


When You Can't Cook, Make Snails

by Betery



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Anxiety, Crochet, Embroidery, Fiber Arts, Gen, Healthy Coping Mechanisms, Mentions of PTSD
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-17
Updated: 2020-05-17
Packaged: 2021-03-02 18:53:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,498
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24241630
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Betery/pseuds/Betery
Summary: Hunk's usual coping mechanism is cooking, but with the kitchen out of commission, he has to find something else to do. Good thing he finds some lovely aliens to show him his new favorite hobby!
Comments: 3
Kudos: 8





	When You Can't Cook, Make Snails

**Author's Note:**

> Sometimes I get these plot ideas, small fluffy ideas that I call Plot Bunnies. So I hope you enjoy this fun little project!

Being away from home was difficult. At first, it was because he was away from what he was familiar with. The daily routine at the Garrison, his regular letters from his family. His music that he had listened to while he got ready for bed! Everything was exchanged for unfamiliar tech, no contact with his family at all, and silence that seemed to swallow up anything that tried to make a sound.

Pidge had solved the music problem herself by compiling a list of music from her computer and Lance’s phone, and then again when she managed to save Altean music files from the library stores, and now everyone had music to listen to. Even if they couldn’t understand it. Hunk had found a playlist of what Coran had call ‘the island people’s’ songs, traditional drum music, and singing, and it very much reminded Hunk of home.

Cooking was nice too, especially since he convinced Allura that they should start growing their own food, but there wasn’t enough music or food in the world the block out the war. War always took its toll and everything was getting out of hand. The further in they got into the war the more every movement he heard in the castle sounded like danger. Hunk had taken to sleeping and carrying his bayard everywhere. Lance had knocked on his door before coming in for Peter’s sake and Hunk had screamed and nearly shot his best friend!!

“Hey! Buddy!” Lance shouted and Hunk felt his heart racing his vision was blurry and where he could have sworn was some Galra soldier was bus buddy Lance who didn’t look.. scared having a gun pointed at him but he was worried.

“Hunk, Buddy,” Lance soothed, “Put away the bayard and we can talk.” The weapon dematerialized nearly instantly and Hunk slumped feeling the corners of his eyes burn.

“Lance i- I would never I-"

Lance gave an easy smile and wrapped his arms around hunks shoulders. “I know bud. But we gotta talk about this.”

So, Hunk told Lance what he knew about what was going on, how he was afraid about getting jumped all the time and the nightmares especially the nightmares. Hunk at some point started rambling about home and how much he missed his mom's food and Lance also shared what he missed and they cried together and man…he's missed this. There are only like six or seven people at max at any time how could he have missed Lance this much?

Then Hunk started balling and begging Lance to forgive him because they been in space for what’s felt like forever and he’s realized how HORRIBLE of a friend he’s been. Not standing up for Lance’s callouts in battle straight up leaving him sometimes to finish some project with Pidge.

Lance hugged him and rubbed his back “I get it bud I get it. Let’s schedule more buddy buddy time and try and see if Coran can get you anything to lessen your sleeping problems.

Coran had some tea for Hunk to try and suggested to Allura they go to a commerce planet nearby for some time off.

“Besides,” Coran said, twirling his mustache, “It’s healthy to take breaks! Especially in war.”

Allura had relented and to the commerce planet, they went.

“This planet has a variety of specialties,” Pidge noted on their way to the transport pod. “Food, mechanics, and various ‘arts'" they quoted, “maybe they’ll have an earth stall again.”

Hunk agreed, “I mean hopefully we won’t get another cow for making a purchase.”

“Hey!” lance interjects, “Kaltenecker could _use_ a friend you know!”

Pidge and Lance then got to bickering about the merits of getting another cow or perhaps getting a bull which Hunk wasn’t really for because Bulls were AGGRESSIVE.

They made it planetside and docked their ship. Coran headed over to some sort of currency trader some sort of jewelry in hand for trade. After some haggling and Coran throwing in his cufflinks, Coran came out with a sizable amount of money.

“Good riddance to those frivolous pieces of jewels I say.” Coran assures after Hunk had expressed concern for possibly Coran having to sell important sentimental items, “Those were house warming gifts from my Great Aunt Lashalta. She had the habit of…letting people know her closest thoughts. Even if they were horrendously inappropriate and she never really had a talent in gift-giving. Trust me No.2 nothing has truly been lost.” And handed them each a small allowance each to get something ‘fun’.

Hunk desperately wanted to get something to cook, but sadly they had to fix the stove and oven (as in getting replacement parts because after the last battle The section powering the kitchen got hit by a huge power surge and things may have… exploded. Just a little. They have been on food goo for… a while.

“I’m gonna go see if we can find any replacement parts for the Kitchen!” Coran announced, “You all enjoy a little shopping.”

Hunk pocketed his money and headed off into the sea of seemingly endless vendors. Some were making things like glass figurines, and actively making objects from clay and Hunk could have sworn he could smell bread in the air.

He walked into a section that had weavers, places full of all sorts of fibers arts like dolls, tapestries, and clothing. Some of these items looked decorative but then Hunk spied some sort of weaved item that was holding a potted plant. Near this blue plant with yellow flowers was a semi-circle of aliens actively talking as they moved their hands and worked their yarn. It was nostalgic because he remembered his grandma doing things like that. He would sit with her on visits and she would tell them stories of his grandfather going fishing with his friends to sell on the market and how she used to make the fishing nets because ‘those store-bought ones just don’t do it’.

That little homesick part of hunk flared up and he decided to approach them, “Hi.” He greeted his voice cracking a bit and he waved at them, the women and a couple of children looked up and smiled warmly at Hunk, “Hello. Would you like to join us?”

It looked pretty fun. There was even a little girl sewing up sections of yarn to make some sort of…snail? That looked pretty neat.

“I don’t really know anything about uh, yarn. Or the hooks. Or the uh, needs? If that a hook on a needle?” He points to said needle hook that one of the older women were working on, the stitches she was making looked like a polygon, honeycomb? Yeah, man, he hadn’t had _honey_ in forever….

The group giggled and one of the younger ones, just a couple years younger than Hunk had feathers lining her neck fluttering with her breathing and she grabbed some yarn and a hook, “It’s pretty easy to start fiber hooping.” She offered the two to hunk, the ball of yarn was a warm yellow. 

Hunk didn’t have a chance to refuse the yarn and hook and was unceremoniously dragged to the pillows, “You’re a paladin right?” The girl asked, getting another hook and ball of yarn from her bag, “Which one?”  
“Uh, the yellow paladin, I’m one of the legs-Uhm I don’t mean to intrude-“

“Oh, it’s no trouble.” Said another woman, her neck feathers smoothed down her neck and across her shoulders, “You look interested and who are we to refuse recruiting another student?”

“Here, start off like this.” Hunk looked at the girl who still hadn’t introduced herself and she did a small twist of her hand and pulled through some of the yarn and got a large loop, she tugged on one end and it got…smaller?

He tried to mimic her actions, but the loop wouldn’t close. The group chattered on and Hunk and Del’tara (she at some point rattled her name off but hunk was having to remember so many things it was difficult enough at it was) There were a couple of ways to start the loop and hunk found it much easier to wrap the yarn around his finger first to start the foundation.

He worked like this for what felt like a long time but soon enough he heard Lance’s called which snapped him out of the row he was making. The hook and yarn were hard to hold in his hands but overall he really enjoyed the activity.

“Hunk!” lance called again, heading over to the booth that Hunk was sitting over at he had a bag or two, and Hunk stood up to, along with a couple of the merchant ladies.

“Hey Lance!” Hunk called, holding up the start of his..scarf? Potholder? Whatever. “They’re teaching me how to do uh- this looping thing. With yarn.”

“Oh hey that’s crochet!!” Lance announced leaning closer to take a “My Abuelita does a lot of that stuff back home. She makes and sells afghans and quilts and stuff. She said that this kind of stuff was relaxing, so maybe this is the sort of thing you need!”

Hunk grinned, pride in his small square of yarn, Lance winked and turned to face the circle of women, “Ladies, as the Blue paladin of Voltron I thank you for taking such good care of the Yellow paladin, I think we’re going be buying some of your yarn.”

“There’s no need.” One of the older women said, she wore a scarf on her head and a shawl on her shoulders, she wore a crest as a broach on her shawl that glittered in the light occasionally as she walked, a basket in hand with yarn in it, “As paladin’s of Voltron I think we owe you a little bit. My whole life this planet was under Galran rule, our wares taxed heavily, and our practices hidden in basements beyond the sight of the soldiers. When you freed this sector, you freed our culture and since then we have been _flourishing_ so thank you. I think a few skeins of yarn isn’t too much to ask for to help Hunk here. And I’ve included a data chip with some patterns on it, and an instructional guide. Mimina helped code it. If you come back by, you’ll have to tell me how helpful it was.”

Wide-eyes and slack-jawed Hunk took the basket of yarn, there were so _many_ he wasn’t sure what he was going to do with it. But he looked at the younger girl’s finished snail and he _knew_ he had to try that. Even if it took all this yarn to get it right.

“Yeah, sure. Thanks so much!!” Hunk promised, handing back the hook, “Can I, keep the yellow yarn? I can buy it if-“ but he was wrapped in a hug before he could finish, the yarn being placed on the top of the basket and they departed with laughs and waves.

When hunk unpacked the basket at the bottom of it was a leather wrap full of the elegant hooks. Hunk was _definitely_ going to take care of these.

\--

Hunk settled in his room, yarn in one of his drawers and one of the yarns in his hand, and he worked the square some more, concentrating hard on working on the row, it was slow going but he felt like he was making good progress, maybe sometime in the near future he could work on a _round_ project. First, he needed to figure out why his square was turning into a uh..triangle. and why one end was so much smoother than the other. And why some parts were stretchy, and others were tight. Was he even using the right hook?

Hunk left his room to make lunch in a right state because he had been doing _so well_ when the ladies were helping him out. Huffing over his shrinking project he chewed on his bottom lip. Who could possibly help him with this? He looked over at the data chip on the nightstand by his bed. Shrugging, he put down his yarn carefully on the bed and reached for the data chip.

Pidge had managed to create a couple of tablets from leftover pieces of tech from the castle with the help of Allura and Coran, that way they all wouldn’t have to share Lance’s phone so much. He had started getting protective if _very_ unhealthy manners around his phone, like hiding it in his room, and straight-up hissing once when Hunk had wanted to take a picture of some of his cooking.

So, he took the tablet and he slotted the data chip in and waited for the info to load. It took less than a minute cause Pidge built the best gadgets EVER and he opened the files.

Which then ran into the problem that he couldn’t read ONE WORD of this language. He felt his soul wither and he slumped, mournfully looking over at his yarn project.

NO! He straightened his back, “I’m not giving up that easily!” He declared to no one and headed off to the person he figured could help him the best: Pidge and their awesome language decrypting skills.

\--

“It’s gonna take a few hours.” Pidge said, after taking a look at the files, “It seems a bit archaic in the syntax but that makes sense for a subjugated culture.”

Hunk nodded, and he twiddled his thumbs, “Uh, do you know if Coran has fixed the kitchen yet?”

Pidge shrugged, “Last I checked he had cornered off that section for no one to go into. Said that the equipment he got needed ‘finagling to reconfigure into the power base of the ship’ or something like that.”

So…no cooking then.

“Right. Thanks, pidge.” He could just do something else. Hunk looked around the engineering lair, everything was clean, not spotless per se but there were no loose hatches to mend as there had been at the beginning of this whole space samurai adventure. He could see if yellow needed some buffing. Lance liked to do that when there was nothing else on the docket.

“Uh, Hunk?” Pidge hedged and Hunk startled out of his thought process, looking at his friend who looked up from the consoles they were working on.

“Yeah?” He asked, as though he hadn’t been standing around doing nothing but trying to figure out what to do.

“Go do something with like, Lance or whatever. Have a spa day. Clean the cryo-pods. Do SOMETHING other than looking like a lost kneazle.”

Doing a spa day with Lance wasn’t that bad of an idea!

“Sure, yeah. I’ll go look for Lance, thanks pidge!”

“Yeah yeah just go on and have some fun okay?” Pidge said and waved him off. Hunk jogged out of the workroom and started his hunt for his best buddy.

Lance was in his room, hanging out on his bed, leaning against the scrolling at his phone and looked up when the door opened, his face lit up when he saw Hunk.

“Buddy, pal- what’s the occasion?”

“Uh well, ran into a snag with the uh, crochet, and Coran hasn’t fixed the kitchen though so I thought that we could…have a spa day?”

Lance’s face practically filled his room with its own light from the amount of happiness and Lance was showing and he leaped out of bed in a flash, “Hunk, my best buddy, you are going to _glow_ when I’m done with you.”

Hunk wasn’t so sure about the glowing part, but he was sure that it was going to be fun. He followed Lance’s example with the fermented food goo. ‘you’ve gotta get the layer even or it’ll take forever to dry!’ and they even used some sort of sugar scrub that they used on their arms and legs.

“So how’s the crochet going? Gonna make anything cool?”

Hunk smiled, “I saw one of the aliens making a snail, and I sort of remember how she did it. But I’ve gotta be able to make a square first without it shrinking.”

Lance was drying off his arms from the sugar scrub and reached over to give Hunk a pat on the shoulder as he went for the sink to wash off his own sugar scrubbed arms.

“It’ll be okay, even if Pidge takes forever to translate the instruction you can still learn by experience. That’s what we had to do with our lions after all. And our bayards.”

“True enough.” Hunk conceded leaning close to the mirror to see if his mask was dry yet. Some areas were thicker than other but there was definitely a crust forming.

Supper came around and Hunk did actually feel a lot better after the spa day and age the goo with little to no gagging. It always had this green taste to it, so he tried to pretend sometimes it was just celery jello. Just a weird thing that maybe one of his aunts would try and not like this, bland superfood in order to give proper nutrients to any number of aliens.

Man, Hunk missed the kitchen.

“Hunk.” Pidge called from her side on the table, “I got the stuff you needed translated but it’s incredibly lingo oriented.”

“Lingo?”

“It’s a lot of abbreviations of the stitches. There’s a glossary so that’s okay but I think it’ll confuse you at first.”

“Not exactly a confidence booster Pidge.” They rolled their eyes and pushed their glasses up further onto their nose.

“Well, it’s a good thing that I know a thing or two about crochet. I can show you a few things about it and give you a good foundation so you can follow the manual.”

Hunk checked the food goo to see if his jaw had dropped into it and thankfully, no, that wasn’t the case but he felt the tears coming on.

“Oh Pidge!!” Hunk cried and shot up from his seat running around the table to scoop Pidge up into a hug. They struggled and kicked their feet in the air and Hunk didn’t mind it at all, he was going to show his appreciation. What was Pidge’s favorite food? When Coran fixed the Kitchen he would have to make something really nice.

Pidge wormed their way out of Hunk’s grip, and Hunk was still grinning. “How soon can we start?”

Pidge huffed, flopping back into their chair and took a spoonful of food goo and shoved it into their mouth making Hunk wait eagerly and Pidge made a giant gulping noise.

“We can start this crochet party when we’re done eating.”

Hunk pumped his fist, “I’ll go grab the stuff!!” He said and dashed out of the mess hall.

When he reached his room he grabbed his stash of yarn from the nice basket that Coran had given to him and his hooks from the drawer on his nightstand. And he, of course, grabbed his poor shrinking yellow square-triangle.

Hunk made his way back to the mess-hall and not only was Pidge waiting for him but Lance Keith Shiro and _Allura_ were there waiting expectantly.

“Hey!” Hunk grinned, though it felt a bit strained, “Not that I’m not happy you guys waited for me but uh, if you all wanted to try this out I think we’re gonna have to take turns…”

Shiro smiled gently back, “It’s no worries Hunk, Lance just suggested that we could use this as an opportunity to hang out with each other.

“I’m gonna take this chance to sharpen some knives I got from that commerce planet.” Keith pipped up.

Lance snorted, “Keith how many knives does one person need?”

“As many as I can hide.” Keith easily barbed back and Lance. Lance looked Keith up and down a little frown line appearing between his eyebrows.

“Does that mean you have a knife-“

“OKAY!” Pidge butted in, “I’m all for bonding moments or whatever but this is meant to be an _educational_ bonding time, okay? Lance that means not deflecting Hunk’s attention when it gets hard.”

Lance gasped and clutched at his chest as though he had been struck there, “Me? Deflect? What am I, a mirror? Trust me, I’m just gonna be chilling around and just hanging with my friends, maybe even learn along with you.” He wiggles his fingers and Pidge rolled her eyes as she led the way to the common room.

Everyone started walking behind them, and Allura took up a place next to hunk, he hadn’t noticed it before, but she was holding a bag.

“Whatcha got there?” Hunk asked, motioning to the bag and Allura smiled, reaching in and took out some cloth and thread.

“My mother used to embroider in her spare time. She used to work on such gorgeous tapestries, and I thought that since we’re doing this team bonding, I might try to learn the craft that she treasured so much. It won’t be easy, but if I can heal a Balmera I’m sure I can do this too.” Her face was soft as she looked at the small amount of supplies and Hunk smiled along with her.

“I’m sure she would have been so happy.”

Allura nodded and they continued to walk.

\--

“Okay. Okay Hunk- look at this closer. I’m inserting the hook at the end of the row _here.”_ Pidge slowly presses the hook into two loops that hunk was trying to identify on his own ‘swatch’. Hunk also inserted the hook into the yarn and Pidge examined it closely.

“Yeah, that’s the right one. Now loop over and pull through.” With a relieved sigh hunk did as told and turned his work. Pushing the hook through, presenting it to Pidge who examined it closely and nodded, and Hunk grinned, working a little more on the row. Even after just a couple of hours with Pidge babysitting him, he was doing a LOT better at this.

Lance had joined in and had gotten the hang of it like a…fish to water? Paladin to Lion? A cat to a box? Eh, Hunk wasn’t sure which one fit well enough, but it was really nice that everyone wasn’t judging Hunk for needing Pidge to check his work.

He looked over at Allura who was making what looked to be a sort of flower. “It’s a Juniberry.” She had said earlier as she was making the sketch with a pencil. “My mother’s favorite.”

It was coming along super well.

It took a couple of ‘potholders’ but Hunk eventually got the courage to try a hat. He made it blue and grey and even attempted to make it slouchy. Pidge told him to make a large rectangle and they would show him how to make it look like a ‘hat hat’ ‘Oh, and ask Lance if he wants a pom-pom’ on the end. Which hunk did, and Lance was like ‘Nah don’t wanna put to much work on ya.’ So that was that. It took him a while to make the rectangle and he was always double-checking to be sure the diameter was right but eventually, Pidge _did_ help him sew it all together and Lance was super stoked to have it. He didn’t take it for a _very_ long time. (he did wash it, Hunk saw him once and he did it with such care!)

Hunk then asked Pidge to make a ‘foundation ring’ which is what the manual called it, and Pidge took a look at the manual snorted and showed not one, but TWO ways on how to do it.

Hunk wasn’t really into starting a foundation ring or a ‘magic circle’ as Pidge called it. ‘ _I didn’t get much farther than this but it’s the basics. After this, you’re pretty much on your own buddy.’_ But Hunk was totally fine with that he was finally about to start making a _snail!!_

Crocheting a snail wasn’t easy but he got the hang of it after a couple of tries, and Coran had been kind enough to offer up a way to getting some fluff by ‘re-arranging of proteins in the food goo! One small sequence change and BOOM you’ve gone from edible protein and vitamin-filled diet to practically useless fluff! Well, aside from helping you with making little snail friends.’ Coran had been fascinated and wanted to look into messing with the sequences of food goo even further, and thanked Hunk for this new side project.

Hunk practically vibrated with joy, he now had more fluff than he knew what to do with, and put the box of fluff in one of the corners of his room and… had to sew it together.

Hunk hummed; he _could_ use the hook to _attempt_ to sew it together but having a needle would be much easier. So Hunk got up, and headed to the workshop. Around the room, there were various pieces of metal he was sure he could sculpt something small enough to be a needle. They had _plasma laser_ for crying out loud, but when hunk tried using the plasma laser and some spare sheet metal but without some kind of buffer to smooth everything out it was just barely usable.

Maybe…Allura might have...? Hunk sighed and pocketed the sad state of a yarn needle and headed to the princess room. It only took one beep and Allura answered.

“Hello, Hunk! Is there something you need?”

Hunk nodded and reached into his pocket, “I need a large blunt needle to sew my projects together. Pidge showed me how with the crochet hook but…it takes a bit long.”

“That’s alright. Uhm…I could look in a container that my mother left to me. It had some sewing supplies in it, perhaps it has one of these larger blunt needles you need.”

Hunk smiled, his shoulders relaxing in relief, “Thanks, can I come in?”

“Of course!” Allura exclaimed and Hunk stepped into an area to the castle he had never been to. He had looked at the schematics yes, rerouted power from different Jefferies tubes and such but he’s never been _in_ the room before.

It was much larger than his room, and he had just moved into a bigger room himself to make room for his new yarn collection. There were fancy furniture, couches, and chairs with a theme of soft blues with accents of gold in areas such as a gold vase on a table in the corner.

“Ah!” Allura exclaimed from a different place in the apartment, “I found some of the tapestry needles my mother used! Much bigger than the embroidery needles but you never know when you need to use one! Here, you can keep it.”

The needle was blunt on one end and the perfect size to sew his snails together!!

“Thanks so much, Allura, I promise I’ll make one special just for you!”

Allura smiled at Hunk, one of those ‘your one of my most dear friends’ smiles “I’ll hold you to that promise.”

\--

Voltron's work was always something on the to-do list. Train as a group, train on your own, make sure no one is left alone too long, but there was always at some point downtime. Which was now, as Hunk eagerly slipped back into his room with the blunt needle to complete his first-ever snail!! He took some yarn and pressed one end through the eye of his newly acquired gift. The next step was to take the two shells and sew them together up most of the way, stuff them with the food-goo fluff- sew again. And BOOM shell. After that, all he had to do was stuff the body, and since it was a less symmetrical shape this was WAY easier. (Finishing the top off with the tail he had left behind was difficult due to the shortness, but he managed.

He stuffed the tube body and pondered over the bulbous head, but he shrugged before going back at it and carefully sewed the body to the shell. Making sure that it’s tight enough to hold but not too tight to dent anything. He wasn’t entirely successful, and occasionally his hand spiked with aches and pins and needles but it was fine. He finally made his snail and carefully he set it on his nightstand, taking in the yellow shell and white body, god if only his mom could see him now!!

He went to bed content with his progress…..but he got up again in excitement to continue sewing.

Eventually (after two more snails) he had gone to bed content with his progress. When he woke up, his right hand _throbbed_ He sat up with a grown and looked down at his appendage. Visibly it looked fine, and if he held still it mostly felt fine, when he tried to pull his shirt over his head the cracks from his wrist and the shooting aura of agony begged to differ.

It was fine. He was sure if he just rested it a bit, maybe gave himself arm a massage it would be okay. He got to breakfast gratefully for the automatic doors because he wasn’t sure how he could handle doorknobs. Maybe he could handle today without stressing his hand and he would be right as rain tomorrow. Sadly, he met the first hurdle: eating food. Holding the utensil just caused his hand pain to flare up so he decided to switch from eating with his right hand to his left and, yes, it was very awkward.

It started with his drink cup he was going to pick up the pitcher of nutrient space juice. (well..not space juice per se, they found a ton of berries on an M class planet a while back and Hunk wanted to grow more of them in the atrium so they could have something else other than food goo).

Pidge must have seen the switch even with her bleary ‘it’s too early or this’ expression because the look that they gave hunk was one that said something along the lines of ‘why did you switch hands?’ to which Hunk deliberately didn’t meet pidge in the eyes because he didn’t have an answer other than ‘I may or may not have hurt myself.’

He poured the juice into his cup, moved it delicately across the table WITH his hurt hand to prove to himself that he could use it, the rushing aching pinching sensation that came from it heavily encouraged AGAINST that action so he moved back to using his non-dominant hand.

Holding the eating utensil with his left hand was weird and the food goo kept sliding off his spoon.

“…you okay there, buddy?” Lance asked after the third time the goo fell off his spoon before Hunk could shovel it into his mouth.

“Uh, yeah. The goo is just slipperier than usual today.”

“Huh.” Lance scooped up his own food goo, jiggling it for a sec, “Seems normal slippery-ness to me. Pidge?”

They scooped up some goo, gave it a small shake, “Yeah, seems normal.”

Everyone was now looking at Hunk and he felt his brow start to sweat and he tried to laugh it off, “Oh yeah, of course, it’s only me who’s having difficulty! Yeah, silly Ol’ Hunk!”

Shiro gave Hunk the _look._ The kind of look that made you question your own choices even when they were held with good intentions. Hunk called this look the Dad Look. Because like it or not Shiro was the most responsible for everyone.

“You’ve been pretty quiet number 2.” Coran intoned, twirling his mustache and dammit Coran and Shiro were _so_ not allowed to team up that shouldn’t be allowed!

“….my hand _might_ hurt.” He admits, and he was swooped up and shepherded to the infirmary where he was sat on a table and Coran picked up a handheld machine, pressing a button and it turned on, white light beamed out of it and Coran held it over Hunks hand, and then carried it up to his arm all the way up into his shoulder.

“My my you have done a ringer on yourself here Number 2. Swollen joints and a myriad of bones shifted every so slightly out of position! I daresay this seems to be repetitive stress. Late-night activities I take it with your fiber ropes?”

“…maybe. But they’re handmade SNAILS Coran! I finished my first one and it’s so CUTE.” A little white lie wouldn’t hurt, right?

Coran nodded, “I’m sure it is, but considering that you’ve also been making those dish squares you might’ve overdone it.”

Hunk took in a deep breath, “How long until-?”

“Don’t you worry!” Coran assured getting another instrument, “Good thing about our medical science, we have a gizmo for everything! Now tell me if your arm starts feeling the way cooked Aravanamana looks, I haven’t used this in a while.” And started it up.

Hunk’s eyes got wide and his breath got short he was trying to form his words. Why was Coran using a thing that could make his arm look like an Aravara- ara- whatever he’s sure it’s supposed to be some sort of noodle- was it really called a gizmo and Coran was just messing with him? Oh, WHY hadn’t he brushed up on the medical tech???

“And we’re done! Your arm should be spik and span! Keep in mind this shouldn’t become a habit young man. Or else I’ll have to let you recover the good ol’ fashion way.” Coran, like expected, wagged his finger at Hunk like he was five or something. Hunk felt like he was five. He needed a nap.

“I’ll try to be more careful.” And he did, mostly because Voltron work caught up with everyone fighting the Galra trying to stay one step ahead of Zarkon decoding messages and ensuring that the castle wasn’t falling into disrepair.

Hunk didn’t let this stop him, so he just decided to make parts of the snails. The two halves of the shells, various bodies in experimenting with different shapes and color combos. Just shove them into a drawer until later. When he didn’t feel like crocheting, he riffled through his pieces and sewed up the snails then stuffing them and placing the finished snails in a different drawer.

Hunk hadn’t realized just _how many_ there were until he went to put away a snail and saw that the drawer was too full to put another snail into it.

Instead of freaking out over it, Hunk decided to have some fun.

Snail conferences in the mess hall, snails placed in different secured areas, snails in the training room posed with little metal fragments for swords.

Hunk even decided perhaps he should go for a MEGA SNAIL. But his yarn supply was running low, and with no foreseeable yarn stations in sight be would either have to learn how to spin his own yarn or start possibly selling his snails for gak.

The next planet with commerce goods was on their list to explore to restock up on various supplies, maybe someone would enjoy purchasing a snail or two, and he packed away plenty of snails in his pack.

However, when they reached the orbit of the planet a peaceful planet they could trade from and just relax wasn’t to be found.

The galra were swarmed everywhere and buildings had been set alight you could see it from _orbit._ Everyone couldn’t even put on their proper undershirts for their Voltron armor. Lance didn’t even take off his _jacket_ when they were rushing to get out there. Hunk barely thought about the fact that he just swung his pack back onto his back in the rush as he grabbed his bayard to push back the galra threat. It was like going to school but instead of being late for the bus it would be being too late to save people.

There were bombings constantly, Hunk was sent to do groundwork and evacuation. The air was thick with dirt or smoke and night had fallen on the planet leaving the glow of the burning planet to light the streets.

“HEY!” Hunk shouted, running through the streets, “Is anyone out there? I’m a paladin of Voltron! I’m here to help!!” 

Shiro had handled the initial evacs, and Hunk was making sure all the stragglers had gotten out to safety, which was tough, maybe Lance would’ve been a better choice? He had more stamina and he could use blue to-

“Helpum!” Shouted a small voice and Hunk immediately stopped in place.

“Hello? Who’s there? Let me know where you are!”

“Helpum!” The little voice shouted again and this time Hunk was able to figure out at least the direction of the voice, there- a crashed building, little eyes glowing through the shadows and Hunk bee-lined for them, and he didn’t even think about it, his bayard changed to a different shape from the cannon and he pulled back on the trigger and a beam of light came out of it catching one of the wall pieces on the ground, just in front of the child and he hoisted the piece away without much trouble. It had been something Allura had taught them not too long ago. How Bayards were never designed for just one shape.

He moved away more of the rubble. It felt like it took forever and no time at all as he made a good-sized opening. The child gasped and backed further into building and Hunk dismissed his bayard back to its neutral state.

“Hey, it’s ok, I’m here to help you.” The child wasn’t convinced, their form frozen and their shoulders trembling slightly. How was he supposed to get this kid back to safety if they wouldn’t trust him? He sighed, taking his back off his back, getting ready for the long haul.

Apparently at some point during all the mess and running around the buttons designed to close the pack had come loose, and when it thumped onto the ground, it flopped over, and what fell out of it? His Snails.

Hunk went to go put them back, but just before he could pick it up a little hand came close to his, reaching out for the stuffed toy.

“Escartum?” The little one whispered, looking up at Hunk. He was unsure of how exactly to respond he just smiled, and pick up the snail, which was one of his larger experiments.

“Do you want him? I think he likes you.” And he gave the snail a wiggle, and the child giggled, reaching out grasping the snail so delicately and then squishing it to their chest.

“Let’s get out of here now.” Hunk advised, closing his pack the best he could using the Velcro, and he held out a hand to the child and they took Hunk’s hand eyes wide. But they had a small army of snails and Hunk was sure they would be okay.

**Author's Note:**

> What did you think? BTW that hand throbbing thing is from VERY personal experience. Please take care of your hands, don't hold the project or hook too tightly, and remember to stretch and pace yourself! 
> 
> Leave your comments and emoji's down below! Tell me what your favorite part is, or maybe what kind of animal YOU would make if you had some yarn and a hook! Or would you just stick to hats and pot holders?


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